Sorba had a one in 75 million chance of suffering both an aneurysm and a stroke — and he did. For the first time, Sorbo recounts what it was like having three strokes while filming one of the most popular shows on television, and he reveals how he made a health comeback.

Related

With his long golden locks and chiseled muscles,
Kevin Sorbo perfectly embodied the Greek demigod with superhuman strength in the
syndicated television series Hercules in the 1990s. However,
as Hercules saved villagers from monsters and other gods, Sorbo, the mortal, suffered
a series of strokes that
affected his vision, his health, and, yes, his strength.

For the first time Sorbo is opening up about his
health crisis in his new book True Strength: My Journey from Hercules
to Mere Mortal and How Nearly Dying Saved My Life. The 52-year-old
actor, then 38, first experienced symptoms of pain, aching, tingling, and cold
sensations in his left arm in 1997 while promoting the movie Kull the
Conqueror. Although he was concerned, his doctors were less so.

“I had several doctors on my publicity tour check
me out, but they didn't believe it was anything serious. I even had what seemed
like a rational explanation, having recently injured my ulnar nerve — the funny
bone,” Sorbo told Neurology
Now, a magazine produced by the American Academy of
Neurology for patients and caregivers.

With his worries allayed, Sorbo returned to his
routine, including his strenuous workouts. But one day while lifting weights,
he felt a searing pain in his left shoulder that he took for a muscle sprain.
Sorbo quickly made an appointment with his chiropractor, who cracked his neck
to alleviate some of the tension in his neck and shoulder.

On his way home, Sorbo felt dizzy, had blurred
vision, and experienced buzzing in his head. The next morning, his speech was
slurred and he had difficulty walking. This time, Sorbo went to the hospital,
where doctors determined he had an aneurysm
near his shoulder that disrupted the flow of blood to his arm.

“Apparently, the aneurysm had been producing blood
clots for some time. I had blockages all down my arm that were making my
fingers cold, tingly, and numb,” Sorbo said.

In fact, Franklin Moser, M.D., a neurologist at
Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, said that one of Sorbo’s two main
arteries that go to the hand was completely blocked. Moser advised an
unconventional treatment where he would insert platinum coils around the
aneurysm to neutralize it.

“He explained the blood would then clot around the
coils and adhere to the walls of the aneurysm,” Sorbo said. “The coil clots
would form a new arterial wall that would allow blood to flow through the area
normally.”

The
Mystery Illness is Solved

After the procedure, Sorbo’s doctor gave him some
shocking news. The MRI results showed that he had had three distinct strokes,
which accounted for his dizziness and aches.

“You had three strokes, Kevin. Three. This is not a
head cold. Any normal person would need months of rest and rehab. You are very
lucky to be walking around. They could have left you far worse off, including
dead,” the doctor said as Sorbo recalls in True Strength.

However since the cause of the strokes, the aneurysm,
had been treated, his doctor felt like he was no longer at risk for another stroke.

Sorbo’s aneurysm-stroke combo made him a bit of a
medical marvel. His doctor said that the odds for someone his age and physical
health to experience both a stroke and aneurysm was about one in 75 million.

Dealing
With the Aftermath

Sorbo continued to have dizziness
and nausea for weeks after he was released from the hospital; his doctors told
him it could last for as long as three months. When he returned to the set of
Hercules, he felt anything but like his superhuman
character.

“I felt like I had been transformed overnight from
a youthful, carefree jock into someone who needed to grasp the backs of chairs
and counters for an arduous five-yard trip to the bathroom,” Sorbo told
Neurology Now. His pre-stroke 12-hour work days were now
limited to just a few exasperating hours
at a time.

For fear of appearing weak in the Hollywood
limelight, Sorbo kept his condition under wraps. “My TV character was
invincible, so we couldn’t have me seem too vulnerable. I am naturally a
private individual, so that worked for me,” he reveals in True
Strength.

Sorbo’s recovery
was a long and slow process. “I went through two years of hell before I began
to feel like myself again,” Sorbo said. “I was depressed and frustrated and had
a bad attitude.”

His feelings, as it turns out, are completely
normal for stroke patients. “Depression is a very common yet relatively
undiagnosed after-effect of having a stroke,” Robert Brown, M.D., chair of the
neurology department at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn., explained in
Neurology Now. “Depression and anxiety, which often occur
together, are very treatable symptoms. They can typically be improved through
medication or a combination of psychotherapy and medication.”

Sorbo worked with a psychotherapist and acupuncturist
to help deal with his negative emotions in a constructive way. Now, he lives an
active life with his wife and three children, though he does still experience
residual arm pain and occasional
migraines, and has a blind spot in his vision.

“My illness made me special in a way that I never
wanted nor expected,” Sorbo said. “I'm not Hercules; I'm a mere mortal with
human limitations and problems. But I am determined to not behave like a victim
anymore.”

This site complies with the HONcode standard for trustworthy health information: verify here.

Advertising Notice

This Site and third parties who place advertisements on this Site may collect and use information about
your visits to this Site and other websites in order to provide advertisements about goods and services of
interest to you. If you would like to obtain more information about these advertising practices and to make
choices about online behavioral advertising, please click here.